Five years in prison for activist who filmed October 2 march

Mexico, Federal District (apro). – Alejandro Bautista, one of those detained this past October 2, was sentenced today to five years and nine months in prison by a Mexico City criminal court.

Bautista, an actor and comedian who in recent years has been strongly opposed to the Super Highway and the South Arch in Mexico City, was accused of offenses against authority, with a gang enhancement, for which the crime was judged a felony.

The sentence was imposed despite the fact that using video footage, Alejandro was able to show that the police who accused him were not the same ones who detained him; as well, he proved that the prosecution’s description of events did not match the time, place, or his actions at the point of his arrest.

In an interview last week with APRO, Bautista explained he attended the commemoration of the 1968 student massacre with the goal of documenting the events, including the excessive use of force by police, as he had been for some time, and distributing it through social networks.

However, at the intersection of Reforma and Bucareli, he was detained by unidentified civilians. Stripped of his camera, he was taken to Juárez Avenue and, hours later, was selected from police holding to be brought before prosecutors.

In recent years, Alejandro Bautista has participated in the indigenous resistance in the south of Mexico City, in opposition to the planned urban megaprojects of the Marcelo Ebrard administration. He personally brought at least 15 criminal complaints for corruption against Ebrard when he was still mayor, as well as against other officials and local politicians, complaints which were not sustained.

The sentence against Alejandro Bautista was received with dismay in the Northern Prison, where there are others who are on trial for allegedly participating in the disturbances.

In a telephone interview, Daniel Palacios Cruz, a guitarist with the rock bands Cavernarios and Telekrimen, expressed his discontent with the conduct of the capital’s justice system.

“Through the judicial process, they can’t prove anything. But if there is political motivation to keep us in jail, as seems to be the case with Alejandro, it causes desperation in us,” said Palacios, who faces sentencing on December 9.

One Response to Five years in prison for activist who filmed October 2 march

Where are all those so-called defenders of “freedom & democracy” & “free-press” and “freedom of speech” from the ‘free’ western world, now; the hypocrites. Their rhetoric is all ‘smoke & mirrors,’ they’re despicable liars. Their ‘holly-wooden-hearted’ producers and pretenders of decency will soon be making millions off Alejandro Bautista’s life story being brought to a screen near you. Yep, meanwhile the lot of world leaders who supposedly defend “rights” and especially “freedom & democracy” and “free speech” are now in South Africa lauding one of this Planet’s greatest defenders of the aforementioned “values” and can only imagine what Mandiba would say to those hypocrites attending his funeral and how forthright he would be in defending Alejandro Bautista’s right to film the proceedings in Mexico.

Advice to all the global hypocrites; please grow a conscience, speak up and help put an end to the horrendous incarceration of Bautista and the abuse of his “Freedom, NOW!